Election 2012 News

A panel of legislators approved language for 11 ballot measures, including the proposals to raise sales taxes by 1 cent, after a contentious three-hour hearing on Monday.
But already, there are hints some of the panel’s decisions might end up getting challenged in court.

The Secretary of State today rejected the signatures of more than 290,000 voters who signed petitions to let the public decide in November whether the state’s sales tax should be increased by one cent to pay for education and construction projects.

The Club for Growth had a short but strong rebuke for Franks today after he appeared in an ad for Cardon in which he “sets the record straight” on the “absolutely false” attack ads paid for by the Club. In the 30-second ad posted today on YouTube by Cardon’s campaign, Franks, who endorsed Cardon earlier this month, says he can personally vouch for Cardon as a “job creator,” “conservative Reagan Republican” and someone with the “business skills we need in the Senate to fix this economy.”

After throwing its weight behind Russell Pearce in last year’s bitterly contested recall election, the Arizona Republican Party is now prepared to help the man it once accused of being a “plant” by the “ultra-liberal” group that sought Pearce’s ouster from the Legislature.

On the face of it, there is little that separates U.S. Reps. Ben Quayle and David Schweikert on policy matters, and both have maintained fairly conservative voting records. But the two freshmen GOP congressmen, who are battling in Arizona’s 6th Congressional District, say there are important distinctions on where they stand on several key issues.

It’s been two years since the Tea Party flexed its political muscles and sent more Republicans to the state Capitol than at any time in state history, and Tea Party activists haven’t put their tri-cornered hats back on the shelf yet.

No longer a backburner issue, immigration is roiling the presidential contest as President Barack Obama and Republican Mitt Romney seek to court the nation's swelling Hispanic population. The outcome could influence political battle lines and shape American politics for generations.